Manners, Severus
by The Happy Monkey of Doom
Summary: After having known the man for twenty two odd years, Remus still finds himself needing to give Severus a lesson in manners. SLASH.


There was a knock at Remus Lupin's office door. He looked up from the assignments he was currently checking and marking, and stared straight at the door as if it was going to reveal some sign of who was on the other side, if he focused hard enough. Finally he put down his quill and said, "Come in."

The door opened almost immediately after those words were spoken. The glow of light from the torch on the wall directly opposite the door caused the visitor's figure to be completely silhouetted, but there was no mistaking this man, shadow or not.

"Severus. I've been expecting you," said Lupin, injecting an ounce of cheeriness into his tired voice. Slowly, the door closed, and as soon as Remus's eyes got used to the constant changing of lighting, he saw the lank, greasy black hair and ever-present cold stare which confirmed what he had already deduced. His visitor was Professor Severus Snape, resident dark and brooding dungeon-goer at Hogwarts.

Severus merely fixed Remus with a cold stare from his glittering black eyes – though Remus was sure nothing was meant by it; after all, it seemed to be the only expression he was capable of – and said, "Lupin."

"Come now, Severus," said Remus, looking down momentarily to move the students' assignments to one side so that he could comfortably rest his elbows on the desk to prop his stubbled chin up with his hands. "Must you insist on calling me by my surname? It seems unnecessarily formal for two people who have known each other since high school."

Severus scowled. "Not to me, Lupin," he said, and held out a mug full of some sort of unpleasant-looking liquid concoction. Remus, noticing this for the first time, smiled and took it. "Thankyou," he said, placing it before him on the desk before him. "I was beginning to wonder if you had it with you."

"I can't think of a reason why I would come here without it," said Severus. Remus fixed him with a searching look, which Severus matched with an unreadable expression.

After a few moments, Remus broke away from the staring match to cast a distasteful glance over the mug which contained his Wolfsbane potion. "Of course," he said evenly, without looking back up. He lifted the mug to his lips and took a sip, his nose wrinkling at the bitter taste. "I only wish you could sweeten this."

"I have told you before that sugar –"

"Renders the potion useless, I know," Remus sighed. He stood up, taking the mug with him, and attempting to down a few gulps in one go. His face twisted up and for a second it looked as if he were about to spit it all back out, but he managed to swallow it. He wasn't trying that again; he could waste half the potion. "Thankyou for taking my classes for me, by the way."

"You have thanked me before," Severus reminded Remus, watching him warily but not making a move to leave.

"I have." Remus acknowledged the fact with a humorous smile. "I just thought I'd make it clear that it was meant in most sincerity."

Severus glared at him, but Remus's smile merely twitched at the edges, threatening to burst at any moment into a grin. "I don't suppose you could make it any clearer," Severus said, partly in jest, although this was hard to spot as the tone of his voice hardly changed at all.

There was the grin – and even a little chuckle to accompany it. He finished the potion and set the empty mug down on the space he'd cleared on his desk. "I daresay I could," he said, amusement evident in his words. He took a few steps towards Severus, who found the nature of the shabby werewolf's grin to be more cheeky every second.

The Potion's Master flinched under the other man's touch, staring down his nose at the hand which had brushed against his shoulder and whose palm was now resting on his upper arm. "What," he began in a blank monotone, "are you doing?" It sounded more like a statement than a question in his tone.

"I'm making it clearer," said Remus, and the grin widened – which Severus had previously thought impossible – to one of obviously devious intentions. Severus curled his pale, thin lips into a condescending sneer, but was forced to abandon this when Remus pressed his own lips against them in a kiss which truthfully startled Severus beyond anything which had occurred to him this year.

Remus grasped the shoulders of Severus's robes tightly, and, still in the midst of the kiss, led him across the office and pushed him back against a wall. Severus pulled away at that moment, much to Remus's dismay, and shrugged his shoulders away from Remus's grip. "Lupin, you are suffocating me," he said icily, and moved to the side as if he were about to leave.

"So that's it?" said Remus. "No 'Anytime'? 'You're welcome'? Not even so much as a 'Don't mention it'?" He cocked one eyebrow, smirking at the thoroughly annoyed look on Severus's face. "Your manners are decidedly questionable."

"Do you really think now is the time to begin a re-enactment of memories from twenty years ago?"

"No. This time, it will be better."

"I thought we agreed to put that all behind us when we graduated."

"We didn't. You made that up. Now, are you going to start being civil and let me violate you?"

Something like a twitch quirked at the corner of Severus's mouth. Somehow, Remus had managed to make him smile more times than even Lily Evans ever had (in fact, she made him want to cry a great deal more than smile since sixth year). He wasn't going to let this man have him smiling again, at least, not so early in the proceedings. He had to do something before Remus started really trying to make him grin, because he knew it would work.

Severus took on an air of great contempt. "Fine," he said irritably, and stepped back against the wall before Remus.

"That's better," Remus said, with another light chuckle, and kissed Severus again. This time it was more forceful, and Severus's hands felt immediately inclined to find their place on Remus's hips.

Although Remus seemed to be leading the way at first, it was eventually Severus who pushed his tongue through Remus's happily obliging lips and turned the kiss into one of far greater intimacy. After that advancement, it wasn't long at all before both of them were desperately groping and grappling with each other, hastening to slip out of robes and unfasten buttons. They were half-naked and stumbling into the bedroom to become more so, forming mutual contact with parts of their bodies which had each been deprived of another individual's touch for a depressing period of time.

Animalistic grunts and drawn-out moans of pleasure emanated from each man's lips over the course of the next seventeen minutes. Actually, it was a stroke of dumb luck that no-one happened to walk past Remus's office door during that time, because in the heat of their suddenly surfacing lust they had stupidly forgotten to lock it. And they weren't exactly keeping themselves quiet, either.

Finally they lay beside each other on the bed, both of them fully spent, breathing heavily in the afterglow. Severus looked questioningly at Remus and Remus looked back. "Remus…"

"Yes?"

"You're welcome."

"I know." Remus smiled triumphantly at Severus again, eyes twinkling.

"What?"

"You called me Remus."

"Yes." Stony-faced.

Remus paused for a moment, before saying with some uncertainty, "That's a sign of friendship, isn't it?"

"Would you really call anything we've ever had friendship?" Severus stared at the man next to him in the bed, coal-black eyes focused with an intense gaze which strayed slowly down Remus's body to where it was concealed by cream-white bed sheets. He looked back up at Remus at that point to find two painfully adorable, amber-brown eyes staring back at him.

Remus thought about that question, and grinned to see Severus's eyes wandering as they had, ever since they first exchanged 'hello's in the library way back in first year. When Severus looked back up at his face again, Remus replied, "I suppose not. Shall we do that again, though?" Severus rolled over, flinging the sheets out of his way as he did, to straddle Remus's hips in reply. "I'll take that as a – mmff…mmmm."


End file.
